


grace under pressure

by thisissirius



Category: 9-1-1 (TV)
Genre: Emotional Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, References to Dubious Consent, Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-01-16
Packaged: 2021-03-13 16:14:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28781061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisissirius/pseuds/thisissirius
Summary: The worst thing is how people look at you.As if in that small strip of time between not knowing and finding out, you’ve changed.
Relationships: Evan "Buck" Buckley/Eddie Diaz (9-1-1 TV)
Comments: 36
Kudos: 343
Collections: 9-1-1 ▶ Edmundo "Eddie" Diaz / Evan "Buck" Buckley





	grace under pressure

**Author's Note:**

> written for an anon on tumblr. 
> 
> this is a fic i have Not Written for so long and yet, here we are today. i don't know what to say about it.

“I had sex with her.” Buck stares down at his hands. “I was on her couch. She—”

“Take your time.”

“It was just sex, you know? She friended me on Facebook.” Buck winces, eyes darting across the person in front of him, to the clock on the wall. Forty-five minutes. Just get through this and he’ll be outside. “Before—before the appointment.”

Silence.

“One minute she was helping me, and the next,” he trails off. “The next we were having sex.”

The worst thing is how people look at you.

As if in that small strip of time between not knowing and finding out, you’ve changed.

“January 10th, 2018,” Buck says.

Everything stops.

“How do you even know that?” Hen asks, frowning.

Bobby’s watching him, and Buck knows he’s working out, going back to whenever that was in his head.

“After Devon,” Buck says.

“Fuck,” Chim says softly.

Eddie narrows his eyes. “You didn’t go after the truck bombing?”

“I mandated it,” Bobby says.

“I know,” Buck says, tapping his fingers on the table. “I did that text thing. Where you can talk to them over text.”

Bobby’s lips thin and Buck knows they’ll be talking about it later. If he can get out of this conversation in one piece.

“So who,” Hen starts.

“Nobody,” Buck says. It’s true, in a way. “She was nobody.”

Conversation lapses and it doesn’t start up again until they’re lounging around the loft, Buck on the couch, Bobby making something in the kitchen. Buck doesn’t know where the others are and he can almost feel the tension in the room ratchet up several notches. It makes his skin crawl.

“Bobby,” he says, knowing it’s useless.

“What happened?”

Buck opens his mouth, closes it. “Nothing.”

Though frustrated, Bobby curbs his irritation, schools his face. Buck’s impressed; it’s the fastest Bobby’s gotten over his exasperation. “Buck. You can tell me.”

“No,” Buck whispers. “I can’t.”

Silence.

“We had sex,” Buck blurts, because it seems like the easiest thing.

Bobby’s expression is careful. “Okay.”

“Not,” Buck starts, licks at his bottom lip. “Not before or after. During.”

“During what?”

Buck’s head jerks up. Eddie’s standing at the top of the stairs, duffle bag over one shoulder.

“Buck was just telling me about his plans,” Bobby tries.

Eddie’s been Buck’s best friend for two years. If Buck can’t tell _him_ then how can he—

“The reason I won’t go to therapy,” Buck says, looking Eddie in the eye. A numbness spreads from the center of his chest to his fingers, toes.

“Buck,” Bobby starts.

“I had sex with my therapist.”

Silence.

Horrible, deafening silence.

Forty minutes.

“Why didn’t you tell anybody?”

Buck shrugs one shoulder. “Tell them what? They knew I was fucking around. Literally. Why would sleeping with my therapist be any different.”

“But you know now it’s wrong?”

“No,” Buck says honestly, clenching his hands into fists. “It doesn’t feel wrong. It just feels like we had sex.”

“Stop _saying_ that,” Buck snaps.

“It’s what happened, Buck,” Hen says carefully.

“If you don’t want to hear it,” Chim starts, holding out his hands.

Careful. Defensive. Like Buck’s the one who’s going off the rails when it’s because they’re acting like—

“Like what,” Eddie says. His voice is level, eyes piercing.

Buck runs out of steam. He curls his fingers around the railing, stares down at the trucks. He’s saying things he doesn’t want to, that he doesn’t even realize he is, and he just wants everyone to go away, to pretend that today’s some horrible dream.

“Buck,” Eddie says, louder, approaching from the left. Buck can see him out of the corner of his eye and Buck thinks it’s deliberate. Fuck. “How are we acting?”

“Like I was assaulted.” Buck’s voice is a whisper, words dropping like heavy stones.

“It’s what—” Chim cuts himself off.

“Give us a minute?” Eddie asks. His tone is authoritative, strong, and even Bobby moves away from the kitchen.

Buck’s hands won’t unfurl from the railing.

Pressing up against his side, shoulders touching, Eddie looks down at the trucks, fingers mere centimetres from Buck’s. “If Chris came home and told you his therapist had sex with him, what would you say?”

The breath is punched from Buck’s chest. Time seems to slow. “Don’t,” he says, voice cracking on the word. “Eddie.”

“Hey.” Eddie’s voice is gentle but his touch is not, peeling Buck’s fingers from the railing, free hand against Buck’s neck. Buck still can’t breathe and he doesn’t know what to do. “Buck—”

“It’s different,” Buck continues, looking at Eddie’s shoulder so he doesn’t have to look him in the eye. “Chris is a kid. He can’t—he wouldn’t know how to say no.”

“You know that doesn’t matter?” Something in Eddie’s voice forces Buck to look him in the eye. “Devon had just died,” and Buck forces himself past those memories, “she was in a position of power. It’s against the law.”

Buck imagines he can hear the clock ticking.

“Systematic grooming is different from just one session,” Buck says slowly. “We didn’t really talk much. Had sex and just—she told me to leave. Said it was unprofessional.”

“You researched afterwards?”

Nodding, Buck picks at an invisible thread on his pants. “I like to do that. Eddie says it’s to work through my trauma,” Buck makes a face, unable to stop a small smile when he thinks about Eddie’s expression.

“You don’t believe that?”

“No, I do,” Buck says quickly. “I just think the research is wrong.”

A pause. “Because you were assaulted.”

“I wasn’t,” Buck snaps. “It was just sex.”

The truck is still running.

Buck stares at Eddie’s front door. “Aren’t we going in?”

“We can,” Eddie says slowly. He doesn’t move.

The silence stretches thin, taut and breakable. “Please don’t make me talk about it.”

Eddie breathes slowly, reaches across the center console and hesitates before resting his hand on Buck’s arm. “Whatever you need.”

Buck meets his eyes, almost breaks under the scrutiny. “Don’t treat me like—I’m not different.”

Dropping his hand, Eddie’s fingers curl around the steering wheel. His knuckles are white. Buck’s oddly fascinated with the twist of Eddie’s mouth, angry and tense. “The others all knew you then.” It’s not what Buck’s expecting and he swallows. “I only know Buck 2.0,” Eddie’s mouth twists again. Buck knows he hates that moniker. “Never once,” Eddie continues, staring at the light spilling onto the tarmac from the truck, “did I think anything like this.”

“Yeah, well,” Buck starts.

“How long have you known?”

Buck pauses, stares at the center console. There’s loose change from when they took Chris to the ice cream parlor. A chapstick that Eddie claims isn’t his. A button that tore off of Buck’s jacket. “I looked it up after. If it was—”

“—your fault,” Eddie finishes. “You’re not different.” The shift makes Buck pause, wondering where Eddie’s going with this. “Or if you are, it’s for good reasons. Not bad. This is on her. Not on you.”

“I said yes,” Buck says, slowly, so Eddie gets it.

Eddie swallows, scratches at the steering wheel with a fingernail. “Do you really believe that? Or are you scared of what it means if you do?”

Buck stares out at the driveway, breathing swallowed by the sound of the engine, and presses a hand to his chest.

“Why does that word make you angry?”

Buck doesn’t do either of them the disservice of asking which word. “Because it wasn’t. I consented. We were having sex. I had _fun_.”

“What does Eddie say?”

Frowning, Buck says, “Did you speak to him?”

“No. You mentioned him earlier—I wondered if you had told him.”

“I did,” Buck says. “I was trying to tell Bobby, my captain, and he was there. I didn’t know but he’s my best friend. I couldn’t lie.”

“Would you have?”

“He never would have known. I could have kept it a secret as long as I wanted.”

“Have things changed?”

Buck snorts. “How can they not?”

Silence.

“He asked me if I was scared,” Buck continues. That night in the truck, Eddie’s blank expression, the sound of the engine rumbling in Buck’s head. “Wanted to know if that’s why I won’t say—that it’s anything except sex.”

“How did you react?”

Buck stretches out his legs. There’s faded marks on his jeans from kneeling on the floor; always playing with Chris, or taking him to the park, or, or, or. “Eddie’s got a son.” Buck’s gaze flickers up, but the change in subject doesn’t seem to make a difference. “Chris. He’s nine. Amazing kid, strong. I keep thinking,” Buck continues, forcing words past the sudden lump in his throat, “what if it had been him. Eddie asked me when I told him what I would do.”

“Hmm. What would you do?”

Throat tight, eyes burning, Buck looks at the clock. Thirty minutes. Fuck, it’s taking too long. He doesn’t know if he can do this.

“Buck?”

“Chris is a kid,” Buck blurts out. “If some therapist had sex with him, I’d want them in prison.”

“If it was Eddie, then.”

Buck’s chest squeezes tight. “What?”

A shift. “If Eddie came to you, told you that he’d had sex with his therapist.”

The thing is—

Buck knows it’s illegal. The knowledge is there, bouncing around inside his head. If Eddie ever tells him that, ever confesses, words spilling between them like bile, Buck will know. Someone’s taken advantage of Eddie. Assaulted him.

“I’d think,” he starts, can’t continue.

“Why do you think you’re different?”

“Because,” Buck says. His lungs burn, air clawing its way out of his throat. Suddenly, with a veracity that surprises him, he wishes Eddie was sitting next to him. “I don’t know.”

“I love you,” Eddie tells him, leaning in the doorway. He’s wearing a threadbare shirt, pants that ride low on his hips. They’re sleeping in separate rooms for the first time in—Buck doesn’t know how long. Not because Eddie wants it, but because Buck can’t stand to see the way Eddie looks at him, doesn’t want to feel trapped.

Buck nods, clutches the sheets in his hand. “I love you too.”

Eddie’s silent.

“I do,” Buck says, quietly. “I love you, but I need space.”

“I’ll give you whatever you need,” Eddie replies, eyes searching Buck’s face. “You know that, don’t you?”

Buck says nothing.

“How do I make myself believe it’s assault?”

“It’s a process.” The reply is soft, understanding. “All the conviction from people you love and trust can’t make you change your mind if you don’t believe it. You’ve researched, you’ve heard it, and you’ve said it out loud; a power imbalance is dubious consent at best, nonconsensual at worst.”

Buck leans his forearms on his knees. Fifteen minutes. Now the time seems to be going too quickly, speeding away from him faster than he can keep up. “That doesn’t answer the question.”

“I can’t give you a definitive answer, Buck. There is no right answer. Perhaps you will never believe it. Or you already believe it, you just don’t want to.”

Closing his eyes, Buck scratches his hands into his hair. “Everything changes.”

“Has it?”

Sunlight hits the windscreen of the truck.

Buck winces, shields his eyes. Eddie’s in the driver seat, scrolling through his phone. There’s a few stickers on the back window that Chris put there, giggling and ignoring Eddie’s lamentation about his new truck. Drinks bottles and paper are littered over the back seat, various artwork from Chris and scribbles about his and Buck’s plans for a new fort in the backyard. Buck’s spare keys in the center console, a picture of the three of them taped to the back of the visor.

Opening the door to the passenger side, Buck slides in quietly.

“It feels like everything’s changed,” Buck says.

Eddie waits.

“Something between us changed, but that was me, wasn’t it?”

“No,” Eddie says slowly, a sad smile on his face. “I didn’t want it to, but you can’t expect me to hear something like that and not change. I’m angry at her. At you for not realizing. That’s selfish, I know it is, but you do all this research.” Eddie trails off, reaches out and takes Buck’s hand. “I still love you. I want to protect you. I want you to protect yourself.”

Love crushes all of the negativity crowding Buck’s head. “I’ll come back next week.”

Buck knows he’s not imagining the relief in Eddie’s eyes. “Okay.”

“I still don’t think it’s assault,” he falters on the word but says it, a small victory. “Maybe I will after this,” he continues, waving a hand at the building, “or maybe I won’t. I just want to go home, hug Christopher, and watch a movie.”

“Then that’s what we’ll do,” Eddie says, starting the truck. Before the pull away, he raises his eyebrows. “But don’t think you get to make these decisions every day.”

Buck laughs, turning to look out of the window. Maybe his thoughts scatter, some dark, some light, but his smile doesn’t falter all the way back to the house.


End file.
